By Tracy (biancaheart@yahoo.com)
Rated PG
Category: Ryan centric, FF, AU,
Spoilers: "Stray"
Summary: Ryan's journey to find a place for himself in the future.
Disclaimer: Don't own. Just borrowing to have a teensy bit of fun!
He pulls a picture out of his pocket. It's old, wrinkled and faded now. He can hardly make out her face anymore, he's rubbed his finger across it so many times.
Like it would bring her back, a genie in a bottle.
He takes a deep breath of air.
He doesn't look like a freak.
Words, words that should have dissipated long ago still hang in the back of his minds. Words not erased by kind people with good hearts- the ones that took him in and gave him a home. Those words and that look of hate that would glimmer in his stepfather's eyes…sometimes they haunted him.
When he was adopted, he took a whole new name. The name that was usually followed by a string of cusswords. He took his adoptive parents' last name and picked an entirely new first name. He kept his middle name. His mother loved that name.
His favorite movie was "The Sixth Sense". Little Haley Joel Osment seeing dead people. He'd almost worn out the DVD he got for his 12th birthday, playing it over and over. Watching the boy go from being a hopeless freak to being a hero.
As he grew up, he learned to focus his powers. He didn't always hear each and every thought that rambled around in people's heads- that was very much a blessing. Sometimes his stepfather's thoughts had been worse than his words. Now he could only hear thoughts if he wanted to; when he wanted to.
His parents had believed him; had cared about him and helped him through. Just like...just like the Kent family he'd stayed with for a while a long time ago. Unconditional love. The kind of unconditional love that had made him the man he was today.
Not that he didn't ever use his powers for less than utopian ideals…how else
would he have known that Liz Valenti's prom date broke up with her the day
before the prom? And it certainly
helped on the highways- kept him out of accidents and collisions; that was for
sure. And the pictures….
He'd found an old camera in his adoptive parents attic. He became entranced with it; took the pieces apart and took dozens and dozens of pictures. And then they gave him photography classes. In high school, he'd even worked with a photographer. His pictures were what had led him here; to Metropolis.
He had a job; a real job.
He was on his own, away from Edge City.
He stepped into the newsroom of the Daily Planet.
Journalism…he'd wanted to do journalism since he met that pretty girl back in Smallville…Chloe. Chloe reminded him of his Mom….beautiful, and filled with wonderful and amazing thoughts and dreams. She'd called him one of "her guys". He'd developed a crush on her right at that instant.
He'd been on the yearbook and the newspaper staff in both high school and the year of junior college he'd attended- his writing wasn't quite as good as his photography, but it was getting there.
He gave his name to the desk receptionist.
A reporter buzzed out of the main office.
"Susan, I need you to call City Hall, the Whitthammer museum and Burger King." The lady said, not even taking the time to stop and talk. "I've got a story to write."
"Who was that?" He muttered in amazement. He'd only heard a glimpse of her thoughts, but she seemed…familiar.
"Mad Dog Lane." The secretary sighed, taking out a phone book.
Perry White, the editor and boss at the Planet stuck his head out the door.
"Where in the hell is the new kid….Jimmy Olsen?"
This was it—don't' blow this one, Ryan!
He stood up.
"Right here, chief."